Nov. 19: Monday’s deadline is set for 8 p.m. ET, according to Jon Morosi of MLB.com (Twitter link).
Nov. 17: MLB commissioner Rob Manfred told reporters that he expects an agreement to be reached (link via ESPN’s Jerry Crasnick). “I don’t sense that this is a disconnect with the union,” said Manfred. “These are relatively small issues. … I don’t think they’re earth-shattering.”
In fact, Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic reports that the union’s issues with the proposed agreement aren’t necessarily related to Ohtani. The union is on board with extending the current agreement for one year but takes umbrage with several components of the system that would go into place next offseason.
The system, as currently constructed, would allow NPB teams to post players throughout the majority of the offseason; the union, not wanting domestic free agency to be held up by the uncertainty of whether Japanese players will be posted, wants NPB teams to make that call by Nov. 15.
The new proposal also awards the NPB team a sum that is equal to 20 percent of the contract the player signs with an MLB team (not 20 percent of his actual contract, though) and allows the NPB club to rescind its posting of a player if it is unsatisfied with the contract to which he agrees. Rosenthal notes that MLB allowed the pullback provision due to NPB concerns that a player could sign a small deal and then sign a much larger extension within a year or two.
Beyond the extension matter, though, it’s easy to see where NPB might take issue to the 20 percent system without the ability to withdraw its player. The new system bears some similarity to the previous blind bidding system. Under that iteration of the posting system (which is still in place with the Korea Baseball Organization), all 30 teams were allowed to submit blind bids for posted players. That player’s NPB team would then have the ability to accept or reject the top bid.
There’s no word yet on how NPB views the MLBPA’s wish to remove the “pullback” component, but it’s not hard to imagine they’d be reluctant to agree without that luxury. With no way of knowing precisely how MLB clubs would value a player, an NPB club would be taking a significant risk by posting one of its stars and then merely hoping that an MLB team would be willing to pay enough to make the posting of said player profitable.
Both the blind bidding system and the current $20MM maximum give NPB teams some degree of up-front knowledge of how they’ll be compensated; without the “pullback” system in this scenario, they’d effectively be rolling the dice on how MLB teams value their top talents. In the case of a legitimate superstar, there’d be little reason for concern. Rather, there’d be upside, as clubs with that rare caliber of player would stand to gain considerably more than the current $20MM maximum. But in the case of above-average players that aren’t necessarily at the Ohtani or Yu Darvish level, that system would be substantially more risk-laden and may simply prevent NPB clubs from posting all but star-level talents.
Nov. 16: The MLBPA has set a Monday deadline to come to an agreement on a new posting system, Heyman now tweets. If the union sticks to that deadline, MLB clubs will have clarity on Ohtani’s availability as much as two weeks earlier than Halem initially suggested.
Nov. 15, 10:10pm: The MLBPA is still holding up negotiations, per FanRag’s Jon Heyman. While MLB, NPB and the MLBPA are presently at a “standstill,” there’s still optimism that an agreement will eventually be worked out. Heyman reported last week that the union had significant concerns regarding the fact that the Fighters would stand to receive a $20MM windfall while Ohtani himself would only be compensated at a maximum level of about $3.5MM.
12:12pm: The hope is that Major League Baseball and Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball will finalize a new posting system at some point in early December, MLB Chief Legal Officer Dan Halem tells reporters including Joel Sherman of the New York Post (Twitter link).
Until that comes to pass, Japanese sensation Shohei Ohtani will not be able to begin the process of moving to the majors. At this point, an agreement on the system seems to be all that stands in the way of what promises to be a fascinating posting.
As Newsday’s David Lennon reminds us on Twitter, it took until December 10th for a new posting agreement to be struck back in 2013, paving the way for Masahiro Tanaka to finally sign about six weeks later. There’s no particular reason to think that Ohtani’s own signing process will follow a similar trajectory; if anything, he’ll likely have quite a few more serious suitors to consider.
Barring a big surprise, then, there won’t really be much of an indication of where Ohtani could be headed when the Winter Meetings take place in mid-December. Teams will likely be forced to weigh major trades and free agent signings without knowing whether they have a real shot at the market’s most intriguing name. While Tanaka held up the pitching market quite notably during his own period of recruitment, perhaps that won’t happen here since Ohtani won’t require that kind of financial commitment. But his situation could yet weigh on the rest of the market in any number of ways, particularly since he’s expected to desire some kind of commitment to being utilized both on the mound and at the plate.
Halem also touched upon a few other matters in his chat with reporters. In particular, the league is set to engage with the MLB Player’s Association on new pace-of-play initiatives, as Bob Nightengale of USA Today tweets. A variety of potentially controversial measures (most notably, a pitch clock) will be weighed, with the hope of reaching agreement by the middle of January.
Additionally, Halem noted that the league is looking into complaints regarding game baseballs. Testing, says Halem, has not shown any differences from 2016 (via Alex Speier of the Boston Globe, on Twitter). But the league will be looking into the matter further, he says and Jon Morosi of MLB Network tweets.
He’s going to an American League team!! Harold Reynolds pointed out a smart question today..he asked Ken Rosenthal where he’s going to play on his off days? And Rosenthal answered OF but only played OF a handful of times in Japan. There ya go ladies and gentlemen! That rules out every NL team..
Not really. It rules out any team not willing to play him in the OF. NL teams will probably take a risk and let him play LF
So ken said he would play outfield and you’re saying that rules him out of playing outfield?
All 30 teams are in play until he signs
He said he only played OF a number of times. I’d be highly shocked to see a NL team gamble on him to play OF with very little OF experience. I mean yes it happens, and can happen, it happens more often than usual, BUT them Guys also have a backup position, Ohtani does not other than pitching. let’s not kid ourselves here, He’s more suitable for an AL team
He has played 62 games in the OF, seems like plenty of time to judge his viability. I can see where a team might not like to risk losing a potential ace arm to an outfield collision but I highly doubt that would be a deal breaker for every NL club. Plus with all season interleague play the DH spot will still be an option, maybe not as frequently as in the AL, but still another place for him to find some AB.
If the Cubs are willing to put Schwarber in the outfield then I don’t see why other teams would hesitate at putting the much more athletic Ohtani in the outfield.
The Phillies just had Hoskins playing leftfield even though he was a 1b his whole time in the minors. They even had Roy Oswalt out there,once upon a time.
Agree
Who cares where Ken Rosenthal plays on his days off?
LMAO
I think it’s interesting Kenny only played a handful of games in Japan on his days off.
Right, like cubs wouldn’t play him instead of Schwarber In outfield
If Otani were only a pitcher teams wouldn’t have a problem. They always need another starter. Do teams keep their DH spot open just in case Otani is interested?
Yes he’s going to be DH the rest of the 4 days he’s not pitching (just like he has been in Japan). His OF experience limits him from the NL, unless he plans to stick to pitching. Which he already stated that he wants to do both. I can see this going on for a few years, not his entire career. It’ll be interesting to see how it pans out
But he hasn’t been doing that in Japan. He gets at least one non-playing day between starts, which in Japan is five days. Here it would be four.
I feel as if it is way too early to rule out any teams. I don’t understand where the he’s automatically signing with the yankees or cubs is coming from.
Made you look.
Honest question, why was this not negotiated before the posting system expired?
The players were busy all season but MLB and the Japanese league had all the time in the world to come to an agreement before the offseason even started.
just weird, isn’t it?
I can easily see him going to an NL team that would propose something like the following 5-day rotation cycle for him…..
Game#1: Starting Pitcher
Game#2: Rest/ available as PH
Game#3: Start in RF/LF
Game#4: Start in RF/LF
Game#5: Rest/ available as PH
Rinse, repeat.
I think if the Mets can get some international pool money, this would be perfect for them. They’re trying to go down to a 4 man bench, and a pitcher like otani who can provide a bat too would be extremely useful. Plus, it would force them to rest ces and conforto (assuming he comes back healthy) fairly often, which in my eyes is a good thing for both parties.
Sorry Mr.Met your team can’t get the right amount of pool money.
You will have to get used to this kid playing for the team that had his idol who also was a terrific pitcher AND a power hitter. That players name is Babe Ruth.
If you are well behaved we may let you attend a game at the House that Ruth built.
Pretty much as you figure he’ll play 2/3 times a week dependent on the DH situation. Although it’s going to get interesting as we’ve seen former pitchers somewhat have trouble with adjusting to a 5 day rotation. So you’d think there might be some fluctuation on throw days and using off days to lengthen out rest days, especially really early and late. So there might be a possibility he gets 3 starts in a week.
He’ll sign with who ever he wants to sign and play. He’s a special case to some extend because money isn’t that important to him. Proving that he can play here is. I wouldn’t want to guess where he’ll end up. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if he signed with someone for $300K.
I agree, he’s made millions already in Japan, and he knows he will eventually get a huge payday in the states If he pans out
He has not made millions in Japan
He actually had topped that mark in this year alone…
“While his reported salary of roughly $2 million…” SI 4/6/17
si.com/mlb/2017/04/06/shohei-ohtani
Why is this such a big deal? Ohtani himself doesn’t care that the team gets more money then him, so why would the MLBPA?
Because MLB looks after the interests of the teams, and the MLBPA looks after the interests of the players.
If they just added foreign major league service time to the players’ ages before deciding if they fall under the new int’l FA rules, there would be a lot less to worry about.
Just a wild guess that this solution has already been discussed and rejected by one side or another. Suspect at least one problem is deciding which foreign leagues would qualify as professional. Japan and Korea, sure. But what about Cuba and Mexico?
It’d set a precedent, just because one player doesn’t care doesn’t mean the rest shouldn’t either.
The whole idea of Ohtani, an established professional, falling into the same category as a Dominican teenager is kind of silly.
Agree completely. Ohtani is a player under contract with the NPB Japanese league. MLB has maintained a separate agreement with that league concerning player movement. Why do the International Free Agent rules even apply to him?
They don’t, until he becomes a free agent. Or maybe I misunderstand your question.
Well, the same pool of money applies for both, thus all the talk about which teams have how much international signing money and how they might try to sidestep the rules, by offering a ridiculously (and probably illegally) early extension or whatever. This affects the market for Ohtani, if anything in the initial bidding process. If this is not cleared out, it makes little or no sense for teams without much international signing money left to make bids since they can’t legally sign Ohtani because of the pool (or the lack thereof). It struck me as silly that, if a team posts up to 20 million for the right to negotiate with an established professional in Japan, they should be constrained by the same int’l signing money that applies to Dominican teenagers (and this, I think, is where JD396 was getting at.)
But, at the same time, this does discourage young talent from leaving Japan too soon: if they can negotiate with full free agent rights, with corresponding payday, they can, but they’d have to wait for some years while playing in Japan because NPB does not want its best young stars to jump to the MLB. Ohtani is throwing a monkey wrench into that rationale by insisting that money does not matter to him, but NPB should have every reason to maintain a version of this and keep monetary payoff to Ohtani minimal because, if Ohtani still gets a big payday out of this, it’d make it that much more difficult to keep younger stars in Japan–those who might be more interested in money than Ohtani, that is..
He is not a free agent. He is under contract with NPB. NPB is selling his rights to an MLB team for a 20 million posting fee. His rights transfer from one team to the other. His earning potential is reduced by the 20 million dollar fee. He never becomes a free agent at any time. MLB has previously negotiated a set of rules specifically for players leaving the NPB.
An International Free Agent does not have to be bought from another league. They are free to sign with any team they want for whatever amount they can get. MLB intentionally put a cap on these players to allow all teams a chance at signing them.
As JD396 pointed out, it is silly to to categorize Ohtani the same as a 16 year old international free agent.
The useful additional distinction is the 16-year-old in the DR could not be under contract to a pro team at 16 or an older age because the DR doesn’t have any pro ball teams. The posting system was created to make it somewhat more difficult for MLB to poach all the best players in Japan and Korea, though inevitably that happens, but only when they’ve played out their contracts or if their homeland team is compensated.
As you point out, he isn’t really. A Japanese player who isn’t a free agent is subject to the rules that are agreed upon by the NPB and MLB as well as MLB and MLBPA. What concerns NPB is the posting fee. They have no control what players sign for.
If you want to find fault, blame MLBPA. They do have a say and they’ve allowed Japanese players under 25 to be subject to the same international spending pool as 16 year old Dominicans.
But if Ohtani is in a fundamentally different category, does it make sense to apply the same pool of int’l signing money for him as for DR teenagers?
The point, in part, is to penalize Ohtani for leaving his NPB contract too early (thus the limit on signing bonus) and to compensate his soon-to-be former team (posting fee.) The former simply requires that the money that can be paid to Ohtani be capped, not necessarily capped with the same pool of money as for DR teenagers, which it currently is. Maybe there should be a separate pool of signing bonuses for poaching int’l professionals that’s different int’l free agents? Maybe every team should get a pool or something with which they can try to sign ppl like ohtani and another pool for signing actual int’l FA’s?
I wasn’t trying to find any fault. This isn’t a matter of right or wrong, it’s entirely a matter of what the interested parties decide protects their financial interests. They could easily agree to return to a system more similar to the old posting agreement, where the player effectively becomes a free agent in terms of their ability to negotiate a contract with the MLB team winning the posting bidding.
So what number does he wear as a blue jay?
No matter how it’s figured, that 20% comes out of the player’s end. Somehow I doubt that scheme will fly. One that might is a fixed posting fee plus some smaller percentage of the contract.
I don’t think 20% comes out of the player’s end. I believe that the NPB team gets 20% of the value of the deal, not 20% of the deal. So if a player signs for $5 million, the team gives $5 million to the player and an additional $1 million to the NPB team.
I would be interested to hear the economic rationale for that argument. I’m pretty sure it would defy all known principles.
The 20% most certainly does not come from the player’s end.
If that was true, it would certainly be a novel form of economics.
You do realize there is a hard cap on international amateur talent right? This agreement won’t change that in any way, so the teams wouldn’t be able to pay the players more even if they wanted to. So in the case of amateur players like Ohtani, I’m not sure i see your point.
In terms of older NPB free agents, you could argue that the posting fee would’ve been used to pay the player… I see your point there.
My point is, the MLB team is only interested in the cost of the player to them, not how that price is split between the player and his former team. If they believe a player is worth $10M a year, under a 20% fee system they aren’t going to pay $12M for him, they will still pay $10M, with the team getting $2M and the player $8M. The caps and other limits are a complicating factor of course but these are also subject to negotiated change. Also very much subject to negotiation is how pro players in the other national leagues are classified. They are only treated as amateurs because that’s how they are currently classified by the agreements. None of this is carved in granite.
Well it’s carved in granite at least until the next CBA, which is still years away. Your point is well taken when it comes to normal international free agents. But most amateurs are worth well more than the signing bonuses they receive, so that extra 20% isn’t coming out of the players end in that case. If a team signs an amateur for $500k (maybe they don’t have much cap space left) and gives $100k to the NPB (money which does not come out of the bonus pool), it’s unwise to conclude that the team valued the player at $600k. They probably value the player a lot higher but the cap stops them paying more. Ohtani, for example, is worth far more than the few million he’s gonna get. That 20% fee his team will have to pay isn’t money that would’ve gone to him.
This money is coming from the amateur player if you’re considering what he would get in a free market. But this is not a free market.
Granted the CBA and the posting agreements being on different timelines and various other convolutions complicates matters, but I am responding to the proposed changes to the posting agreement with NPB. Right now, a posted player under contract to a team in Japan gets nothing but the bonus and a minor-league contract. If they went back to a bid posting fee and allowed the player to negotiate a contract with his new team, then we’re talking about something quite different, and that player is going to sign for a total cost to the MLB team at the market rate for his services, not the artificially suppressed cost we’re seeing now. I’d imagine the MLBPA would be all for posted players being treated more like free agents, so long as the tax paid to the posting team isn’t too steep.
The players still get to negotiate a contract. It’s not like Ohtani has to sign with a specific team for a specific amount of money. He gets to choose, and also can negotiate the signing bonus. Right? Or am I misinterpreting this
And it says NPB teams would be allowed to rescind the posting of a player if they are unhappy with the contract “to which he agrees”
Only the signing bonus, which is severely limited. If Ohtani was a free agent he’d get orders of magnitude more than any team can offer him as a bonus. He’d also get better than a minor league contract, don’t you think?
The simplest system would be for NPB teams to be able to sell contracts to MLB teams for whatever the market would bear. Not that this would happen because it would turn NPB into little more than a farm league. But if it did, we’d find out in a hurry what these players are truly worth to MLB teams. The proposed hybrid system would get there too I imagine but you’d have to add the contract to the posting fee to get the real value number.
But teams are allowed to bid whatever they want, at least on non amateur players. You’re lumping both sets of players into one group. Players over the age of 25 will be able to negotiate with all teams, and sign for whatever they can get. This new system really doesn’t change how much money the 25+ international players will make. In fact, they might make more now since teams don’t have to submit blind bids and can simply negotiate directly with the player and his agent.
In some cases that could be true. When the Twins signed Byung-ho Park they gave his old team $12,5 million and him $12 million. It’s unknown what they would’ve given him if he were entirely free. The Twins retain Park’s rights for 6 years, even though they signed him to only 4. They might’ve seen that money as investment over a longer period of time.
Ohtani is in a different situation, however. Teams are limited by their bonus pools. So if a team gives their entire remaining bonus pool to Ohtani they couldn’t have given him the bonus pool plus posting fee it ultimately cost them.
My guess is around $25M. Same as when the Dodgers signed Hyun-Jin Ryu. They committed around $60M to him for six years, about half it posting fee. That works out to $10M a season, which five years ago was right in zone for a middle-rotation starter.
The situation for Ohtani is different for a number of reasons, the most important of which is he’s classified by MLB as an amateur so nobody can offer him more than a limited bonus and a minor league contract, the value of which is also fixed.
Wait so the NPB teams would no longer be able to pull their players back after posting them, but they would be able to reject the deal once the player and his new MLB team agreed to a deal? Either I’m reading this wrong or this doesn’t make any sense.
Nevermind, my brain woke up
It bugs me that the MLBPA gets to bargain away the rights of people they don’t even represent.
… or to protect them?
They’re bargaining to protect them ya doofus
Sure, like minor leaguers salaries and bonus caps and international FA (they agreed to hard cap). Lol
The MLBPA uses these negotiations to protect the dollar pool available to the players they DO represent. The interests of the International FA”s – which the MLBPA uses as leverage – aren’t looked out for at all.
The MLBPA has already sold away their interests before they come stateside.
I can’t entirely agree. The MLBPA’s main mission is to claim as much of the MLB revenue pie as they can for current and future MLB players. They have no incentive to devalue any player who is now or will become one,
Their goal is to protect the interests of the players that they represent. There is a direct benefit to the MLBPA to allow throttling of earning capacity for Amateur players, and from that point of throttling, those players are still a number of years away from coming under the MLBPA’s “protection”.
There is absolutely incentive to devalue those pre-MLBPA players – the Owners have all the desire in the world to reduce/cap the dollars they have to spend on these players, and the MLBPA agrees to the restrictions as a bargaining chip – because those exact restrictions are imposed on the players that the MLBPA does not represent. By doing so, with a perceived “pool” of money available to players, they are ensuring that the players they DO represent, don’t have potential earning dollars taken away by Amateur players that the MLBPA does NOT represent.
So, a 22 year old from another country gets to pick the team he plays for and sign a much shorter contract than an American man who is drafted. That 22 year old from overseas will be eligible to sign a huge contract well before an American man. Who is the MLBPA representing? Shouldn’t the union members be filing grievances over this? Talk about discrimination of American kids.
Might sign a shorter MLB contract like Harper did (5 years which included 2 years in minors) but the team still has 6 years of team control and the next contract will be either arb deal that US kids get or an extension that is not subject to competitive bidding
MLB is a monopoly and not subject to anti trust laws. They can stick it to anyone they want especially when the MLBPA has the weakest representation in their history in Clark
Who’s going to file a grievance? Not the Players in the Union – they’re at the point in time where they reap the benefits of the MLBPA bargaining away the interests of those they don’t represent.
The MLBPA restricts the earning potential of players coming out of HS and College, by bargaining for a system where they don’t get to choose where they go, and have little say in how much they earn, despite the MLBPA not representing them.
They do the same for International FA’s. And it’s all a trade-off so the Owners can throttle the dollars they spend elsewhere. The MLBPA has literally no reason to care about anyone who isn’t in the Majors – but they can use those non-represented players interests as bargaining chips anyway – which they do.
Not a lot of brain cells at work in either MLB or MLBPA. Just rank players into 3 tiers. Class A players teams get 3 million posting fee. Class B players teams get 10 million and Class C players teams get 20 million.
If a Japanese team is not happy with where a player gets ranked, he wont get posted. If they are OK with it he does. No uncertainty.
MLBPA does have a good point on the timing. A player gets posted by November 15 or needs to wait until the next year.
So the system needs be more complicated?
So NPB teams get 20% of the contract the player signs but not 20% of the actual contract???? Makes no sense??
Is this Otani thing the whole reason why there’s been basically no moves so far? Upton signing and Healy trade have been the only MLB player moves so far. There were 9 trades made between Nov 1-19. This year, 1 so far. Is this because of Otani, who all 30 teams could use for various reasons, are making the entire of baseball hit “pause” so they can work out who gets Otani???
Well the Mariners have made three trades this week so there’s been more than 1.
This is the MLBPA’s position, essentially.
Yanks will get him, perfect fit!